As episode No. 8 opens, I end up walking up on my quarterfinal opponent, Shamar Bailey, discussing his back injury. I honestly didn’t hear any of that. I just assumed he was fine after his opening-round win.

Shamar actually had a little cut over his eye from that fight that I never knew anything about. The back thing, I never knew anything about. I will say this, usually when you have a really bad back injury, you’re not even walking that well after a fight. Maybe he was hurting, but he called me out. He specifically wanted to fight me, and he made it very known he wanted me. He asked Dana White for the fight, and he got it.

In fact, when we taped “The Aftermath” show this week, he admitted the whole reason he confronted me on camera wash so they would set up the fight.

Now, I started to do a few of my infamous “Woo!” yells around Shamar after that. While those are important to me as the Tony Robbins fan I am, I admit I was trying to get under his skin, as well. I wanted him to fight emotional. I wanted him to fight angry, and I knew every time I did it, I was disrespecting him a little. I don’t think I did it quite as much as they showed – I think they edited it to make it seem a little worse than it was – but I definitely knew I was making him angry. And when people are angry, they don’t fight as well as they can.

When Shamar beat Nordin Asrih in the opening round, he was criticized for just holding Nordin down. I knew the more I could rile him up, the more he’d probably be willing to play my game and stand and bang.

“The All-American”

Before we got into the quarterfinal fights, we got a little pep talk from Brian Stann. The UFC and the military are very intertwined, and Brian is an amazing person, so it was great to have him come in and talk with us. He’s just a regular guy, but he’s also been a WEC champion, came to the UFC and had some struggles, the re-invented himself and just smashed Chris Leben. People love a comeback like that.

Now Len Bentley, he took things a little differently. As a fellow war veteran, he kind of stepped back like, “Who is this guy?” He was shaking his head and stuff. But as time went on in the presentation, Len talked with Brian, and they went back and forth a bit. Brian basically just said he was there to help pump us up. I thought Len was a little disrespectful, but I think that’s just kind of how he is.

I actually heard someone talked to Len recently, and he’s getting hate mail from people. He’s definitely become the most-hated character of this season.
Brock Lesnar, the coach

With the quarterfinals starting, Brock was really taking a more hands-on approach with us. After Len was hurt in training, he realized we needed different training partners, and he stepped it up and made sure he was doing smart things with us. That’s exactly what we needed.

Brock and Marty Morgan started showing us very simple things in the wrestling department. Both Clay Harvison and I were fighting wrestlers, so they just drilled us on how to stop a single, how to stop a double – just simple, basic stuff, and that’s all we did during practice. That’s honestly what I think helped me win.

Ramsey Nijem vs. Clay Harvison

Clay went into this fight looking to knock Ramsey out. That’s his preferred attack. He thought he could take “Stripper Ramsey” out. Clay just didn’t stop the shot, and that cost him. But I tip my hat to Clay. The guy had a cone sticking out of his finger the week before, and then he’s in there fighting again. That takes a lot of balls.

The other thing is that Ramsey is a gamer. You can think he’s a clown and everything else, but that guy is one of the best guys on the show. People didn’t think much of him because he’s kind of lackadaisical and casual. I mean, he was always talking about “Glee” when he first came in the house, and he paints his toenails. But when that cage door closes, he becomes another animal entirely.

Ramsey’s a grinder, and when he smells blood, he goes for it. He got Clay down, he took his back, and he went immediately for the choke.

Nordin’s training session

It may not have looked like it, but Nordin got me through the house. Nordin was the one guy I talked to all the time. I a Christian, and he’s a Muslim. There were plenty of times in the house where me and Nordin would just walk around the property of the house, and I would talk about America, and he would talk about Germany. I basically tried to keep it everything but fighting.

Nordin lost to Shamar, so I told him I wanted to get that loss back for him. I wanted to dedicate that win to Nordin because he was my boy in there. He lost, but I wanted to earn back that honor.

That said, our training session was a little tense. If you took a little bit of “Bruno” and a little bit of “Borat,” add in some fighting abilities, that’s Nordin. I don’t know why he hasn’t had much airtime. That guy is insane.

There were times Nordin would get in the hot tub with his European see-through boxers on, and he would get on top of the hot tub and do the splits and just start yelling. So many times people would say, “Germany, shut the [expletive] up. I can’t take it anymore.”

One moment, I would want to strangle him, but the next he was my best buddy. He literally got me through that house. If it wasn’t for him, there were times I felt I was going to crack, but he kept me strong.

Fighting Shamar

In the first round of my fight with Shamar, I was following the gameplan, though I wasn’t controlling the center as much as my coaches would have liked. That said, I’m comfortable fighting against the cage. I didn’t want to get taken down in the middle of the mat and get held down the way Nordin was. I knew if I gad the cage close to me, I’d be a lot more comfortable in my abilities to get back up.

The other thing about my approach was that I wanted to frustrate Shamar. I knew he was a bull, and I wanted to be a matador. I knew the fight might not be the complete war that people wanted, but I knew that was the type of strategy it would take to frustrate him and win the fight.

I think after he had some early trouble taking me down, Shamar got frustrated. And I know Dana was talking about me letting my hands go, but the gameplan was to throw one or two punches and move. I didn’t want to stand in the pocket and give him a stationary target to shoot in on. I knew I had to stick and move. Nordin tried to throw in the pocket and knock Shamar out, and he was immediately taken down.

I’m a kickboxer. My team said right off the bat they didn’t want me throwing any kicks – not one. They knew I needed to beat Shamar with my hands. There’s a point in the second round where Shamar basically points to his leg and begs me to kick him. He was looking for that, but I wasn’t going for it. I knew he would grab my leg and take me down.

I felt like I opened up a bit in the second round. I knew that Shamar realized he wasn’t going to be able to take me down, so I figured I’d go after it. It’s like Lew Polley said, I do get more and more comfortable as the fight wears on. I usually start slow, but I also feel like I fight smart. I don’t take crazy risks. It’s a chess match – one move sets up the next. I take a methodical approach.

These guys that try to just stand and bang, it’s cool, but you also open yourself up to a lot of places to get caught. You have to be smart. If you’re a moron, you’ll always be a journey man. A smart, technical fighter can get ahead.

At the end of two rounds, I thought a third round was possible, but I knew I was fine if there was. That’s why I started doing those push-ups. I wanted Shamar to know I was ready to go.

When the decision was read, I was obviously happy. I tried to raise Shamar’s hand, but he pushed mine down and walked away. Later, he walked up to me and basically said he didn’t think I won the fight. I told him there were three people that did, so that’s all that matters. Still, he held on to that loss for a while. Much like Len, he just couldn’t get over the loss.

That said, I wouldn’t have been surprised with a third round. It wasn’t like I just manhandled him and kicked his ass. It was close.
The thrill of victory, the agony of Shamar

After watching that fight, I did see a ton of holes that I need to fix. I won, but I wasn’t too impressed with my performance. My hands were dropping. I didn’t throw enough uppercuts. I didn’t throw enough hooks. I could have used better angles. It definitely could have been better. I got the win, which matters, but there’s space for improvement.

After the loss, we see Shamar talking to Dana about his performance. I watched it for the first time on TV, and I admit I was a little surprised. He said he was trying to show other aspects of his game, yet he was trying to take he down the whole time. He pushed me against the cage, but he could never take me down.

Besides, whether it’s a boring fight or an exciting fight, it all comes down to winning. If you lose the fight, you’re out. You do whatever it takes to win. When Shamr beat Nordin, yeah, it wasn’t really exciting, but he won. He went to the next round. When people come up to Dana and basically ask to fight on the finale, man, that should be the least of their concerns. The focus is being in this competition and winning fights. The finale is months away when you’re in the house.

I was happy to win and shut up my pastor. We were still cool, but he was sometimes a little Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. He was the No. 1 pick, the guy that ran shop in the house, but he had a pleasant side, too. Still, he was a competitor. When we did tryouts, we did wrestling, and he worked me for a few minutes. He took me down over and over. I think that’s why he wanted to fight me. But there was no cage in those tryouts. I’m a lot better fighting off the fence.

Bottom line, I had been the underdog from day one, and I was an underdog against Shamar. But I knew if I worked hard every day and listened to my coaches, I could be successful. I remember when I first started training with Dominick Cruz in 2007. He wasn’t as amazing as he is now. But I recently asked him what made him so great. He told me there was no big secret. It’s about busting your ass and listening to your coaches. You do those things, you can go very far.

I’m not gifted at this stuff. That’s the truth. I don’t have crazy knockout power. I’m not a crazy good striker or crazy good wrestler or jiu-jitsu expert. I’m just a workhorse. I grind people out.

Things will start to get crazy in the final few episodes. That house really wears on you. Toward the end, you start to go nuts a little bit. Thankfully, I had Nordin to keep my head together.

Thanks again for reading guys, I was extremely excited to make it to the semifinals, and I knew I couldn’t make it without my team at The Arena and my strength and conditioning coach, Tom Hill.